The meaning and origin of the expression: A shot in the dark

A shot in the dark

What's the origin of the phrase 'A shot in the dark'?

The term 'shot' has been slang for an attempt since the middle of the 19th century; for example, this piece from Joseph Hewlett's comic work Peter Priggins, the college scout, 1841:

"After waiting for a little while, Ninny... made a shot, and went so near the mark."

'A shot in the dark' is simply a hopeful attempt to hit an enemy that you can't see.

George Bernard Shaw seems to have been the first to use it metaphorically, in The Saturday Review, February 1895:

"1 Never did man make a worse shot in the dark."